I've been thinking about this for a while and have come to the conclusion that we as black people lack in many cases is a good healthy dose of shame. In many cases (not all) we've become way too forgiving, way to understanding, way too liberal, way to individualistic and rebellious against wider society which has harmed us.

When I was growing up there was always a healthy dose of shame in my family not a Japanese level but still a lot. Therefore I knew I couldn't come to my parents when I was a teenager saying I was pregant. I couldn't bun a spliff or even smoke with my parents knowledge. I couldn't leave the house dressed like a hooker. My brothers couldn't bring home any old mampy white girl. I couldn't come home with poor GCSE results because after a good dose of shaming I would have to repeat them until they were satisfactory. My parents knew who I was hanging around with (invited them round, (asked me who they were, who there parents were etc) and I had a proper curfew. My parents weren't afraid to tell me who I wasn't allowed to be friends with . I knew I couldn't cause a ruckus on the bus home from school and I knew I couldn't loaf around Edmonton Green with a bunch of latch-key kids whose parents didn't care about them because all of these negative things would have brough severe shame on my family and consequently I would have been punished. I didn't even do things I could get away with behind their back because they instilled in me a sense of pride, fear and dare I say it snobbishness that prevented me from wanting to hang around 'bad' kids and follow them. There was another black family near me whose parents were even more rigourous, they wouldn't allow their kids to play with anyone whose family was broken or their parents seemed suspect, the dad would keep them occupied by signing them up to every activity and playing tennis with them every weekend so they didn't have time to loaf, a lot of the boys near me would say the kids were uppity but they've turned out very well and I think its the disdain their parents had for 'liberal' families that helped them.

Even as an adult my parents would be very angry with me if I became a single mother. My Yankee cousin has a baby for a very older man and eventhough she's still with the man she is under no illusion about the embarrament she has caused for our family to the point when she is practically shunned at family events (although her son is treated fairly as its not his fault) because her dad is deeply embarrassed about what his daughter has done. The younger kids have seen her treatment and will not follow her example. .

Nowadays just seeing the way the kids act on the bus home from school tells me that there's not a great deal of shame in their household. I know of girls from school who got pregnant underage and their parents eventually accepted it (my dad would have driven me to the abortion clinic then beat me because he found the idea of undereducated teenage parenthood intolarable). When a school-friend had a baby at 16 I couldn't pretend to approve and slowly distanced myself from her for I ddn't want boys to think we were birds of a feather I've known smart kids to come home with barely a GCSE and their parents seem ok with it (again I would've been beaten and made to do summer re-sits).

Excluding white people, many other communities seem to have a great sense of shame imbedded in their community (e.g orientals) which prevents their kids from causing problems out on road, we used to have that. Whats happened, how can we bring it back? I for one plan to inbed serious shame within my kids, I don't care whther others feel i'm making them uppity or insular. I honestly think it will help bring down the levels of knife crime, babymother/fatherism (some people wear these labels like badges with pride to show their fertility but I'd be horrified if I was referred to as a babymother or even a 'wifey'. We don't have to go as far as some of them Muslims with their honor killings but I think if more black parents were less liberal, we would see an improvement.

Let’s just have a war on the baby Mammies mentality. The single biggest curse of the black community.

Babygirl...brilliant idea! I hear you with this, human beings function better when they know they are accountable to more than just themselves. I will get back with more later....

I agree with what you are saying, its true we have gone WWWWAAAAYYYY too slack. I remember as a kid, i was more afraid of my mum finding out i had been arrested than anything the police could do to me with all they're powers!

I think that this situation, like most things in life is all about BALANCE. I will try to raise my kids with a sense of shame, but not so much they are affraid of the world or the adventures there in. Some parents tend to be extremist one way or the other, which is damaging. The last thing you want to do is raise a coward, or someone without the tools to genuinely survive on their own two feet.

Oh dear!!! ROFL.....

I was just saying this to my cousin yesterday. There is no shame. When I was at school, try getting the lowest mark in the class 'ooohhh shame, you're dumb!'.

Yeah let's make the black community like the middle east and start stoning people for every mistake they make.


I understand accountablilty, but you have to have balance. Hyper judgemental attitudes don't really solve any issues, when you're only living for the 'image' or facade with no substance behind it.

I can understand the going outside with no clothes on, or an alcoholic, or drug addict(at the same time what to do about helping these people if in the event they want to be helped) but I'm not big on the shaming single mothers. I know too many single mothers who are upstanding people to put them under that umbrella.

So you shame people for the rest of their life to set an example for others. So this person has no way of redeeming themselves while other females hide their pregnancies with abortions and contraceptions. Is the goal to improve peoples lifestyles or just drive people to find better ways to hide and pretend. I'm not with that. I someone feels shame and isolated how will they get help?

I heard about that story. The woman is married, that's why they shamed them.

A healthy dose of shame (not an excessive amount that could damage a person) is definitely needed nowadays. Many kids are out of control and their parents condone it (implicitly or explicitly), which makes things worse. I see the results of this on a daily basis because of my work.

No! Let's bring back 'Pride'. It would be far more empowering.

Now we're talking as long as there's no judgement or haughtiness behind it. Better pride with wisdom and understanding. True there's a decrease in pride these days.

I remember a few years back a report coming out saying black boys are failing in school...I took this as the governments attempt to shame black boys into doing better.

If shame is the punishment for a transgression of pride then shame it is...what we are seeing now are instead of punishment thetransgression is seen as normal - the amoral is becoming the moral.